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A Study in St Anselm's Soteriology and Karl Barth's Theological Method

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

G. Watson
G. Watson
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Extract

Recent discussion of St Anselm's theology of reconciliation has again raised the question of freedom in respect to the relationship presupposed between God and man in this encounter. It has been asked whether in fact St Anselm's account excludes God's ability to act freely, ‘within the dynamics and development of the narrative’, and suggested that such exclusion derives from an understanding of God's ‘unchanging nature beyond the influence of persons and events within the narrative’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 42 , Issue 4 , November 1989 , pp. 493 - 512
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1989

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References

1 See Root, M. ‘Necessity and Fittingness in Anselm's Cur Deus Homo’. Scottish Journal of Theology, Vol. 40, 2, pp. 211ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 See also Aulén, G.Christus Victor. SPCK London, 1953, pp. 101ff.Google Scholar; Denny, J.The Christian Doctrine of Reconciliation. Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1917, pp. 75ff.Google Scholar

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4 Ibid.

5 Barth, K.Church Dogmatics 4.1, pp. 485ff. T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1932ff.Google Scholar

6 Quotes will be taken from the text of Cur Deus Homo translated by Dean, S.Anselm: Basic Writings. Lasalle, Illinois, 1962.Google Scholar

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8 Ibid., pp. 40–41.

9 McIntyre, J.St Anselm and His Critics. Oliver & Boyd, Edinburgh, 1954, p. 185; cf. p. 204.Google Scholar

10 Barth, op. cit., p. 484.

11 Ibid.

12 Ibid. See Anselm, Cur Deus Homo, Bk. 1, Chs. xi, xii, xiv.

13 Ibid., p. 485.

14 Ibid., p. 486.

15 Ibid.

16 Ibid., p. 487.

17 Southern, R. W.The Making of the Middle Ages. Arrow Books, London, 1959Google Scholar; St Anselm and His Biographer, Cambridge, 1963, pp. 93ff.Google Scholar; Hopkins, J.A Companion to the Study of St Anselm. University of Minnesota, 1972, pp. 188ff.Google Scholar

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23 Barth, K. op. cit., p. 487.

24 Ibid.

25 Anselm, op. cit., Bk. 1, Ch. viii, p. 191.

26 Ibid., Bk. 1, Ch. ix, pp. 193ff.

27 Ibid., p. 196.

28 McIntyre, J. op. cit., pp. 40, 78, 203.

29 Anselm, op. cit., Bk. 1, Ch. ix, p. 196.

30 Contra Root, op. cit., pp. 222–224; cf. Root's definition of God's aseity with the comprehensive exposition by McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 167–171, 175, 183–5, 190, 193.

31 McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 162–163, 166–167 and Hödl, L., ‘Anselm von Canterbury’. Theologische Realenzyklopädie, Band 2. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 1978, pp. 775–776Google Scholar; Anstey, C. R. P. ‘St Anselm Demythologised.’ Theology, Vol. LXIV, 1961, pp. 17ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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34 Anselm, Concerning Truth. Ch. vii, p. 102; cf. Campbell, op. cit., p. 331; ‘The notion of things as they ought to be is rooted in Anselm's background metaphysics, not only because it is required for our understanding of his treatment of truth, but also because the same notion plays a crucial role in the argument of Cur Deus Homo’.

35 Anselm, op. cit., Ch. x, p. 108; cf. Chs. i & xiii, also Proslogion, Ch. xiv, op. cit., pp. 21–22. See Campbell, op. cit., pp. 334ff. ‘Things are what they are through the divine Word, and depend upon nothing else except the utterance of a word, or separate words, they are as it were a kind of language, that is why our words can be likenesses of them.’ (p. 335). Foster, M. B. ‘The Christian Doctrine of Creation and the Rise of Modern Natural Science.’ Mind, Vols. XLIII, XLIV, XLV, 1934–1936, pp. 446ff, 439ff, 1ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

36 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. xiii, p. 117; cf. ch. xii, pp. 110–111. See Hopkins, op. cit., p. 135; McIntyre, op. cit., p. 100. For the background to the philosophical question in dispute between Lanfranc and Berengar which was raging when St Anselm came to Bee, see Southern, St Anselm and His Biographer, pp. 24ff.

37 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. xi, pp. 109–110.

38 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. x, p. 108; cf. Monologion, Ch. 1, pp. 38–39.

39 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. xii, p. 120.

40 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. v, pp. 98ff; ch. vi, pp. 100ff.

41 Anselm, Dialogus De Veritate. MPL CLVIII, Col. 469: ‘nihil est verum, nisi participando veritatem’.

42 Anselm, op. cit., Ch. x, p. 108.

43 Anselm, Monologion, Chs. xxxiii, pp. 95ff, xlvii, pp. 111ff.; Proslogion, Ch. xxiii, pp. 28–29.

44 Anselm, Ibid., Ch. xxxi, p. 93.

45 Contra. Prenter, R. ‘Die Einheit von Schopfung und Erlösung.’ Theologische Zeitschrift 2, 1946, pp. 66–167, 171Google Scholar; ‘Glauben und Erkennen bei Karl Barth.’ Kerygma und Dogma Vol. 11, 1956, pp. 76ff.Google Scholar Here it is argued that St Anselm's distinction between faith and understanding, which presupposes the distinction between the Supreme Truth and the truth of created things, tends to a neglect of the creaturely objectivity of the event of revelation and that in this respect St Anselm is too dependent on St Augustine. Cf. Root, op. cit., p. 218.

46 Anselm, Concerning Truth. Ch. x, pp. 108–109.

47 McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 4ff., 55.

48 Ibid., p. 4.

49 McIntyre, op. cit., p. 193: ‘At the heart of Cur Deus Homo there is not rational necessity but Divine Grace.’ Cf. pp. 203–204; contra Hopkins, op. cit., pp. 196–197 and Root, op. cit., pp. 227–230.

50 Torrance, T. F.Theological Science, p. 273.Google Scholar For Torrance it is by their relation ‘to the Incarnation that our statements have their fundamental ontologic for it is in the Incarnation that our forms of thought and speech are grounded in God and yet earthed in the sphere of actuality where we live and move and have our being’.

51 Root, op. cit., pp. 224, 230; Barth, op. cit.

52 Ibid., p. 229.

53 Torrance, T. F., op. cit., p. 273; cf. Torrance, T. F.Space, Time and Incarnation. Oxford University, 1969Google Scholar and the important article by the same author: ‘The Ethical Implications of Anselm's De Veritate.’ Theologische Zeitschrift 24, 1968, pp. 309–319.Google Scholar

54 McIntyre, op. cit., p. 157. There seems to be no link made here between the hypostasis of the Son considered as an empirical entity involved in a moral and spiritual struggle and the voluntarily offered obedience of Christ. (See also on the same issue, p. 169). This Nestorianising tendency in McIntyre is all the more surprising since McIntyre has seen the relationship in Anselm's argument between the voluntary nature of Christ's humiliation and Anselm's definition of God's aseity as the action of his grace (pp. 175, 183, 193). See also on this issue, Hödl, op. cit., p. 775.

55 It seems impossible that Aulén, G., op. cit., pp. 105, 148 should claim that Anselm as an exponent of the typical Latin soteriology should see no organic connection between the Incarnation and the Atonement!

56 Anselm, Cur Deus Homo, Bk. 1, Ch. xii, pp. 203–204.

57 Anselm, Proslogion, Ch. ii & iii.

58 Ibid., Ch. ii, p. 7.

59 See Watson, , ‘Karl Barth and St Anselm's Theological Programme’, pp. 35–36Google Scholar for the differences Barth sees between the proof offered in the Monologion compared to the Proslogion.

60 Torrance, T. F.Space, Time and Incarnation, p. 65Google Scholar; cf. St Cyril of Alexandria. Scholia on the Incarnation of the Only Begotten. Library of the Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church. Parker & Rivingtons, Oxford, 1881, pp. 185ff, 190.

61 Cf. McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 162–163, 166–168, 175, 193.

62 Anselm, op. cit., Ch. xii, p. 203.

63 See Barth, , Church Dogmatics, Vol. 3.2 pp. 21, 113–118Google Scholar; 3.4 p. ix; 4.1 pp. 150ff., 740ff.; Epistle to the Romans. Oxford University, 1968, p. 10Google Scholar; ‘Dank und Reverenz’. Evangelische Theologie 7, 1963, pp. 9ff.Google Scholar

64 Barth, , Church Dogmatics, Vol. 3.2, p. 119.Google Scholar

65 Barth, Ibid., p. 124; see pp. 125ff.

66 Barth, , Church Dogmatics, Vol. 4.1, p. 747.Google Scholar

67 Barth, Ibid., p. 751; cf. pp. 758–777.

68 Barth, , ‘Parergon.’ Evangelische Theologie No. 8, 1948, p. 72Google Scholar and Watson, G. ‘Karl Barth and St Anselm's Theological Programme’ loc. cit.

69 On Barth's understanding of knowledge of the creation as God's creation see Church Dogmatics, vol. 3.1, pp. 348–349.Google Scholar Cf. Jüngel, E. ‘Die Möglichkeit Theologischer Anthropologie auf dem Gründe der Analogie: Eine Untersuchung zum Analogieverständis Karl Barths.’ Evangelische Theologie 22, 1962, S.35ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

70 On Kierkegaard's relationship to Hegel, see Kierkegaard, S.Philosophical Fragments. Princeton University, 1962, pp. 12ff.Google Scholar; Diem, G.Kierkegaard's Dialectic of Existence, Oliver & Boyd, Edinburgh, 1959, pp. 25ff.Google Scholar A similar critique in terms of scientific method is undertaken by Polanyi, M.Personal Knowledge. Routledge, Kegan Paul, London, 1959, pp. 65ff., 70–71, 112–133, 265ff.Google ScholarKnowing and Being. Routledge, Kegan Paul, London, 1969, pp. 140–141, 174–175, 177–179Google Scholar; and the remarkable essay by Heidegger, M., An Introduction to Metaphysics. Oxford University, 1959.Google Scholar

71 Diem, op. cit., p. 18; Kierkegaard, , Philosophical Fragments, pp. 91–93.Google Scholar

72 Ibid., p. 27; Kierkegaard, op. cit., pp. 90ff, 95–96, 103–105; Chamber, M. B. ‘Was Jesus Really Obedient Unto Death?’ The Journal of Religion. Vol. 50, No. 2, 1970, pp. 121ff., 129–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

73 Ibid., p. 18, note 9.

74 Ibid., pp. 89ff.

75 Ibid., pp. 63–64, 87–88.

76 Kierkegaard, op. cit., pp. 100–101.

77 See McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 162ff.

78 Ibid., p. 163.

79 Barth, , Church Dogmatics, Vol. 1.2, pp. 2, 26–31Google Scholar; 4.1, pp. 287ff.; Ott, H. ‘Der Gedanke der Souveränität Gottes in der Theologie Karl Barths’. Theologische Zeitschrift 12, 1956, S. 409ff.Google Scholar

80 Anselm, Cur Deus Homo, Bk. 1, Ch. xii, p. 203.

81 Anselm, Ibid., Bk. 1, Ch. xii, pp. 204–205.

82 Barth, Church Dogmatics, Vol. 4.1, p. 486.

83 Anselm, op. cit., Bk. 1, Ch. xii, pp. 205–206.

84 McIntyre, op. cit., pp. 184, 190.